On June 8, 2017, Greek-born, Canadian-bred pizza maker Sam Panopoulos died. His career slinging pies was rather unremarkable save for one notable thing – he was the inventor of the popular, yet infamous pineapple-topped “Hawaiian Pizza,” named as such because of the brand of canned fruit he used.
Loved by some and hated by others, the sweet and salty pizza is so controversial that it once triggered an argument between friendly nations. While such arguments rage on both sides of it being a delicacy or an abomination, the fact is that the Hawaiian pizza is actually not Hawaiian- it’s Canadian. Here now is the story of pizza and the man who decided to add pineapples to it.Sam Panopoulos left his Greek home with his two brothers in 1956 at the age of 20, bound for a new life in North America. However, on the boat ride over, they made a pitstop – one that forever changed Panopoulos’ life and pizza history. Getting off the boat in Naples, Italy, Panopoulos was overwhelmed by the sights, sounds and smells of a city known for its food. But that wasn’t the case with its pizza. According to the Washington Post, Panopoulos’ first ever bite of pizza was something of a spaghetti-like concoction that left him disappointed in the food item.
Truth be told, pizza at this point had never really been considered a delicacy in the Naples’ food scene. It is often claimed to have been invented in the 18th century, though this is a matter of debate as it all depends on your definition of what pizza is.
If you choose to loosely define pizza as flat bread with toppings strewn on it, there is evidence that the Persian army around the 5th and 6th centuries B.C. used their shields to cook flat bread in this way out in the field. The soldiers would then cover the bread with things like cheese and dates for a quick meal. Further, it is very likely that people have been putting various toppings like cheese on bread as long as there has been cheese and bread (which is a really long time, see: The History of Cheese and The History of Toast). However, many argue that these many references to ancient forms of “pizza” aren’t truly pizza as we think of it.Fast-forwarding a little, Mount Vesuvius leveled Pompeii on August 24, 79 A.D. Why is this important when talking about the history of pizza? Archeologists excavating the site have uncovered flat cakes made of flour that were a popular staple of the diet of the inhabitants in Pompeii and nearby Neopolis, a Greek settlement that later became Naples. Shops were also found in Pompeii that contained equipment and tools that would be consistent with those used in pizzerias.
As to specific early pizza recipes around this time, we are lucky enough to have a cookbook of Marcus Gavius Apicius. It contains several recipes that instruct the cook to put various ingredients on a flat bread base. One recipe specifically calls for chicken, garlic, cheese, pepper and oil placed on flat bread, which is about as close as you can get to a modern pizza without the now traditional tomato sauce. (Tomatoes at this point in history were only found in the Americas.)
By the early 1500s, tomatoes had made their way over from the New World to Europe. The tomato did not receive a warm welcome in its new home; rather, it was greeted with disdain and outright fear – rumors even circulated that tomatoes were poisonous. (A similar thing happened with potatoes, with this tuber not becoming widely popular until some clever tricks and antics used by Frenchman Antoine-Augustine Parmentier in which he managed to convince the masses that potatoes were just fine to eat- see: The History of French Fries.)
This all brings us back to Naples. Not long after the tomato was introduced to Europe, the poor folk of Naples added the demonized tomatoes (often in overripe form) to their pizza-like food item and gave the world the first basic tomato sauce pizza, considered by many to be the birth of the “modern” pizza, known as a “Napoletana” pizza- defined as flat bread topped by tomato sauce and cheese.
Often bought from street vendors, professor of history at the University of Denver, Dr. Carol Helstosky, in her book Pizza: A Global History, notes, pizza at this time was considered a “weekday food” because it was cheap and helped people save money for their Sunday macaroni. To quote, “It was a cuisine of scarcity: Whatever you had, you tossed it on — garlic, anchovies, other little fish bits.”
In the 1830s, American Samuel Morse, of Morse-Code fame, visited Naples and looked upon the pizza being sold on the streets with disgust. “A species of most nauseating cake…. like a piece of bread that had been taken reeking of the sewer.”
This sentiment about pizza seemed to be the norm for quite some time among the affluent.
As to how it spread to be a popular dish among those who weren’t poor, a very popular myth (of which there are a few variations) is that, in 1889, King Umberto and his cousin Margherita (and, also, his Queen) were traveling the country in hopes of calming the advancing tide of revolution in newly reunited Italy. They arrived in Naples after many long nights on the road eating the same fancy food (much of it French-inspired). Tired of overly rich dinners, the Queen demanded something simpler- a commoner meal. So, she was delivered three pizzas by then famed pizza maker Raffaele Esposito, one of which was a supposedly…
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